We are reaching the halfway mark of September. It’s that time of year that you have to stop and look back at 2016 to assess if you met your early goals and start preparing for the end of the year. For Internet Marketers the end of the year is usually inherently busy and as an Internet Marketing Firm in Maryland, we address the marketing needs for many. While some are seasonal and may pull back, it is more common that our efforts in the coming months are some of the busiest that we’ll face. Aleh Barysevich at SEJ has created a great list of 7 end of year internet marketing priorities:
1. Get Holiday Campaigns In-Sync and Finalized
Do you have your holiday marketing and advertising campaigns planned out for the upcoming holiday seasons? If so, now is the time to make sure they are all in-sync and ready to be rolled out at the appropriate times.
When I say in-sync, what I mean is that your holiday campaigns are consistent throughout your entire online and offline presence. The same colors, the same designs, the same message, the same featured products, services, benefits, etc. Similar to your logo, having consistent holiday campaigns will help ingrain your brand and your promotions into your customer’s minds.
Visit Toyota’s main website and social channels. Chances are, you will see that the website’s hero image matches each social profile’s cover photo. And if you went to one of their dealerships, you’d likely see matching banners there as well.
Campaigns like that lead the customer straight to the thing that got them excited about your business in the first place without any breaks in the messaging or distractions.
2. Start Comparing This Year’s Data to Last Year’s
How will you know if you’re on track with your goals and ready to meet them by the end of the year if you haven’t been comparing this year’s analytics data to last year’s? You probably aren’t shooting for the same goals as last year, so you should adjust your data comparison accordingly.
This Conversions Overview report for a service-based business that measures contact form submissions as goals shows that this business is already behind compared to last year. At this stage, it’s important to know whether this year’s conversions were higher, dollar value wise, or if more conversions need to be made during the last quarter to meet the business’s overall goals.
For retailers who can plug a real dollar figure into the goal value, the report will be much simpler. They will instantly see if their website has produced the amount of revenue compared to last year to either meet or beat your goals.
For either marketer, if you haven’t met your goals, then it may be time to look into some aggressive marketing and advertising options for the fourth quarter.
We actively help our clients achieve the marketing goals that they set out for each year, but if you’re looking for new ways to ramp up your end of year sales, plan for the holiday, of maybe want to get started planning for 2017, contact us today and schedule a meeting.